On a large number of electronic devices, for instance in which the display and the touch interface are combined in the form of a touch screen through which the user interacts with a Graphical User Interface, or GUI, displayed on the touchscreen, selecting GUI elements is carried out through a form of pointing on the desired element using the touch interface.
For instance, one may select a textual GUI element such as a word on a display by pressing a finger directly onto the word via the touch screen.
This principle presents a major drawback: the presence of the finger directly over the desired element obstructs the vision of the user, which results in a poor placement precision and the user having to carry out the selection again. This tends to mobilize unnecessarily the resources involved in the selection process, such as an interface controller, an event listener for the touch interface, a central processing unit of the device, etc., as well as the battery used to power all these elements.